Ola Thoresen
Well-known member
I have collected a few graphs from my exercise-app that are quite interesting.
I had my surgery almost a year ago (January 3. 2013), but before that I did not believe I had any symptoms of a heart problem. I exercised quite frequently (2-3 times a week), and had done so for a couple of years. I did mostly stationary biking but was also quite active in other ways. At new years eve, just three days before surgery, I was going skiing (cross country) for almost 30 km, and felt fine.
But in retrospect, when I look at the data, it is quite obvious that something has changed.
So lets start with a graph of my heart rate during a 30 minute stationary biking back in November 2012. This is a typical graph from that period:
This is my regular interval workout. I do the exact same today, which we will get back to later in the post.
As you can see, it is quite "saw tooth"-shaped. My max pulse was around 160, and as soon as the more heavy intervals started, I climbed quite fast up to max, but also the pulse came really quickly down again as soon as the lighter intervals started.
Now, lets jump forward to late January. This is only three weeks post op. (27. January). I felt better than ever, but of course I did not push myself harder than I thought would be safe.
You can still see some saw teeth, and as you can see, I took it quite easy. Maxing out at around 125 - 130 bpm. Still, it seems quite good to be less than a month after such a big operation. You just have to give it to the body, it recovers extremely well...
In April I was really getting back to real exercise, and not holding back on purpose:
However, I was still using beta blockers, and they obviously did work. They kept my max pulse down (still around 165-170), but as you can see, the graph is now much smoother. Even if I pushed myself hard, I did not get the really high spikes with heart rate dropping almost immediately when the easier intervals set in.
Here is a graph from today, December 1:
The intervals are still visible, but only just. The body seems to be able to work at a much higher heart rate over time, and also the max is now closer to 180.
It was quite surprising for me to see this when I first started looking into it. As I said, I did not think I had any problems at all a year ago, but still the data shows that at least something has changed - hopefully to the better.
All the graphs are from doing the same workout, at the same kind of bike, at the same place, so they should be directly comparable. I have not really gotten back to old habits of exercising 2-3 times a week. Getting a bit lazy, and only doing it once/twice a week now, but even so, the results are showing.
I had my surgery almost a year ago (January 3. 2013), but before that I did not believe I had any symptoms of a heart problem. I exercised quite frequently (2-3 times a week), and had done so for a couple of years. I did mostly stationary biking but was also quite active in other ways. At new years eve, just three days before surgery, I was going skiing (cross country) for almost 30 km, and felt fine.
But in retrospect, when I look at the data, it is quite obvious that something has changed.
So lets start with a graph of my heart rate during a 30 minute stationary biking back in November 2012. This is a typical graph from that period:
This is my regular interval workout. I do the exact same today, which we will get back to later in the post.
As you can see, it is quite "saw tooth"-shaped. My max pulse was around 160, and as soon as the more heavy intervals started, I climbed quite fast up to max, but also the pulse came really quickly down again as soon as the lighter intervals started.
Now, lets jump forward to late January. This is only three weeks post op. (27. January). I felt better than ever, but of course I did not push myself harder than I thought would be safe.
You can still see some saw teeth, and as you can see, I took it quite easy. Maxing out at around 125 - 130 bpm. Still, it seems quite good to be less than a month after such a big operation. You just have to give it to the body, it recovers extremely well...
In April I was really getting back to real exercise, and not holding back on purpose:
However, I was still using beta blockers, and they obviously did work. They kept my max pulse down (still around 165-170), but as you can see, the graph is now much smoother. Even if I pushed myself hard, I did not get the really high spikes with heart rate dropping almost immediately when the easier intervals set in.
Here is a graph from today, December 1:
The intervals are still visible, but only just. The body seems to be able to work at a much higher heart rate over time, and also the max is now closer to 180.
It was quite surprising for me to see this when I first started looking into it. As I said, I did not think I had any problems at all a year ago, but still the data shows that at least something has changed - hopefully to the better.
All the graphs are from doing the same workout, at the same kind of bike, at the same place, so they should be directly comparable. I have not really gotten back to old habits of exercising 2-3 times a week. Getting a bit lazy, and only doing it once/twice a week now, but even so, the results are showing.
